


Brontide; A rolling thunder

by HardingHightown



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-08
Updated: 2020-07-08
Packaged: 2021-03-04 18:34:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25150948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HardingHightown/pseuds/HardingHightown
Summary: When the rumble echoes on the mountain she can feel it in her stomach. A rumble like that stokes a panic in her; a deep noise like that would signify collapse or worse back home.“In Seheron,” he tells her, his voice a level softness in the heavy air, “there are storms that rage for weeks on end, the air so hot the rain disappears before it can reach the ground.”They are both strangers in this land.
Relationships: Brosca/Sten (Dragon Age), Female Brosca/Sten (Dragon Age), Sten/Warden (Dragon Age), Zevran Arainai/Female Brosca
Comments: 1
Kudos: 10





	Brontide; A rolling thunder

When the rumble echoes on the mountain she can feel it in her stomach. A rumble like that stokes a panic in her; a deep noise like that would signify collapse or worse back home.

“In Seheron,” he tells her, his voice a level softness in the heavy air, “there are storms that rage for weeks on end, the air so hot the rain disappears before it can reach the ground.”

They are both strangers in this land.

-

She can tell he is surprised when she asks him about the Qun. It is subtle, but there is a momentary clench in his jaw, one she remembered from the first time they met, he in a cage of his own making and she unsure what he even was. It is a moment of doubt swallowed down into his stomach. When he talks about it, she understands why. The Qun is made of absolutes. Of purpose and of practicalities, of regiment and routine. He asks her about her people, and she says that most are born to be what they will be, and some are cast out forever. If they stay they are marked, if they leave they are so much as dead. He accepts that, but she can see the clench in his jaw all the same. Something about the idea of being cast out sits on his shoulders, but she knows better than to ask about it today.

_

He finds his space in the middle of their camp when they stop, which surprises her. He watches them all but says little, bright eyes catching the firelight. It is simple enough when it is a small party. He understands Alistair and Morrigan quickly and says little to Leliana, preferring to let her speak and try to find clues to unpick her. He goes over Bodhan’s wears carefully, seemingly looking for something he never finds, and keeps away from Sandal. He pets the Mabari often. As more join them, he spends less time by the fire, standing on the peripheries of growing bonds.

They keep an uneasy peace until Zevran joins them, and there something shifts. When she asks him why, he asks her if she thought you could be one thing and another thing at once. He is not happy with her answer.

-

A few nights later as rain thumps on the skin of her tent, she takes Zevran to her bed. He is keen, as he had indicated when they met. It is easy to ask and easier to recieve. His form is unfamiliar to her, but he is patient, experienced in a way she is not. She had thought that she did not care for these kind of things, that they were a tool, not a respite. Her experience with men were limited to the handful of times she had offered herself to the minor nobles with her sister, a pressure from their mother who had failed to give them the son they needed. It was performative, it was focused on the end and not the journey that she found herself on over hours with the elf as he took his time over her body, noting each scar and lavishing attention on it. This was the first time she had been touched in years, even by her own hand. After the birth of her own daughter, she had not felt the need to try again. Sex had been an opportunity that had failed her. She was not sure if her mind had changed.

-

Eventually, they fight.

They are half way up a snowy mountain chasing a folk tale, his skin takes on a greyish hue in the cold air. She hates snow, she doesn’t understand it, how it is solid yet dances on the air, how it melts into nothingness, how the flakes of it on her nose make her sneeze for some reason. The excuse to move is welcome. His fighting is regimented, honed, something that he is trained to be as well as do, and she finds weaknesses in it with ease. That is what she has to be; quick, adaptive, able to take any opportunities, any ways to survive no matter how underhand, how bad the form. She takes him down, pinning his huge form under her strong legs with her blade at his throat, and the grudging respect is in place again.

Zevran shares her bed again that night.

-

Orzammar sits on her shoulders like the weight of the sky - the final treaty. She listens out for news on the streets of Denerim, but news is scarce. The gates are closed, and those that have news from within keep it tight to their chest. Endrin is dead, that is all she knows and all she needs know.

The idea of returning home makes her stomach knot. She asks Sten if he will return to his home. He tells her he cannot, and why.

He seems shocked at first that she would help him in finding his sword, especially after his distain for her wandering. In truth when she had first agreed it was to not have to knock at the gates of Orzammar, to buy them more time, but as they travel she sees more behind his eyes that drives her forward. There is a fire in him that she had not noticed, a spark of something on the horizon.

When she takes the sword out of the chest at Redcliffe, he exhales audibly, his body shifting in a way that makes him a new man. When he takes it in his hand, he calls it Asala.

Later in the village, awaiting the horde of monsters that will come with nightfall, she asks him what it means.

“Asala is, roughly, what you would think of as soul. This blade was forged for me. It is a part of me. Do you understand?”

She does, but says nothing, drinking in silence. Zevran invites her to share his bed again. She does not.

-

When they return to Orzammar, she sees him in her environment. Somehow in her imaginings, everything had scaled to him, but it is not that way in the reality. The doorways are tight, the chairs are small. He tells her the smell of the molten rivers is pungent. She feels shame, and wonders if she is angry at him. She is not. This place is not her home any more, and she cannot wait to leave.

The people are scared of him. There is fear everywhere they go, that is true, but here above anywhere they look at him as if he were a darkspawn ransacking the palace. Rica’s man looks at him with a distain that makes her want to gut him, but he is to be King, so she smiles as sweetly as she can manage.

The time there thuds on, betrayal and bile. Leske’s betrayal of her doesn’t even stir a moment of shock or pain, just an empty recognition that it is the way of such a place, such a people. She finds herself wishing that the stone would swallow the whole place and be done with it.

When they leave, he comes to stand with her at the gates.

“Will you return?” he asks her, eyes fixed over the mountains ahead.

She knows she will not.

-

She was not built for politics, and it exhausts her. She spends time away from Alistair and Eamon and all of it and lets it be. He will be King, fine. She wonders how Alistair will fare in negotiations with Bhelen. The thought almost makes her laugh.

They find themselves back in Redcliffe, ready to head to Denerim to launch an assault she doesn’t really understand. She is grateful for the presence of Riordan and Sten, two men more seasoned with the heads of leaders. It is almost a year after she first left Orzammar. She does not feel ready, especially when Riordan tells her what must come next.

Then Morrigan finds her an opportunity. 

Alistair wants to be a hero, of course he does, but she’s not wasted days talking about who gets to wear the shiny metal hat for him to throw it all away for honour’s sake. She knows he expects her to take the same stance, but he doesn’t know how hard she has fought for this. If she had thought there was honour in death she would have joined the legion and be done with it. She tells him to think on it, and to join them in an hour.

Sten finds her before the hour is up. When she tells him what Morrigan has planned, his jaw clenches again.

“You trust her to deliver this?” he asks, with more warmth than she expected. Morrigan was a friend to neither of them, a useful ally to her and an untethered storm to him.

“No.”

“And yet you consider it.”

“Isn’t that what leaders do? Consider all the options?”

“A true leader knows there is a path you seek, and then there is the ditch.”

“Well, if there’s an immortal dragon on the path…”

She pauses for a laugh that she knows will not come. He looks down at her, and she feels a stab of shame. He senses it and, slowly and surely, he places a hand on her shoulder, the blunted nail of his thumb on her collarbone.

“You have been told the path, Kadan. Be careful what you do next. It will be felt across this world.”

The rain beats hard against the stone, the night presses on to her, and she only knows that she does not want the dawn to come.


End file.
